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Challenging Israel’s Myths

November 19, 2012

A carefully cultivated mythology sustains Israel’s territorial claims to Palestine and rationalizes Israel’s ethnic cleansing of millions of Palestinians from the land. Challenges to those myths are typically met with fierce counterattacks, as Lawrence Davidson discovered.

By Lawrence Davidson

Soon after my Nov. 4 analysis, “In Defense of Richard Falk” was published by Media with a Conscience (MWC), the site editor forwarded to me an unusual chastising response. Unusual because it came from a relatively well-known scholar and writer by the name of Fred Skolnik.

Mr. Skolnik is the editor in chief of a 22-volume Encyclopedia Judaica (second edition), a work that won the Dartmouth Medal in 2007. He is also the author of numerous works of fiction all concerning life in Israel. It is not rare for Zionists to take me to task, and Skolnik is most certainly a Zionist. Yet it is rare that those who chastise are of Skolnik’s stature. And so, a reply is in order.

The Flag of Israel

Mr. Skolnik does not like Dr. Falk who, the reader might remember, is the present United Nations Special Rapporteur for the Palestinian Territories. And, because I defend Falk, he does not like me either. Indeed, as far as Skolnik is concerned I am part of “an army of Israel haters … churning out endless … venomous half truths” about the Land of Israel. Nonetheless, Skolnik has taken the time to write a three-page commentary to set me and my readers straight.

He says, “I will state Israel’s case in as few words as possible, though you of course may not choose to publish this in order not to lose the effect you are aiming at.” Well, that is silly. I have no objection to my readers seeing Mr. Skolnik’s response. Here is how you can do so: go to the MWC site; search for Davidson; go to “In Defense of Robert Falk;” and scroll down to Skolnik’s comment.

That being said, here is my analysis of elements of Mr. Skolnik’s case for Israel.

1. Skolnik: “There is no historic Palestine that has anything to do with the Arabs, nor is there an “indigenous’ or native Muslim population there.” Skolnick’s assertion is a very old fantasy or myth that has been developed over the years to allow radical Zionists and violent settlers to rationalize their historical absorption of Palestinian land.

Quoting from the Wikipedia entry for Palestinian People, an entry which reflects the latest research into this subject of who was where and when, including genetic analysis, we find that Palestinians are the “modern descendants of those who have lived in Palestine over the centuries and today are largely culturally and linguistically Arab. … Genetic analysis suggests that a majority of the Muslims of Palestine, inclusive of the Arab citizens of Israel, are descendants of Christians, Jews and other inhabitants of the southern Levant whose core reaches back to prehistoric times.”

Furthermore, “a study of high-resolution haplotypes [DNA sequences] demonstrated that a substantial portion of Y chromosomes of Israeli Jews (70%) and of Palestinian Muslim Arabs (82%) belong to the same chromosome pool.”

What all this means is that the ancestors of those Palestinians who are now culturally and linguistically Arab have been in Palestine for time immemorial. Over the ages, the population fragmented, acquired differing religious, linguistic and cultural traits. Indeed, those indigenous Palestinians, Jews and local Christians as well, are basically the same people gone in somewhat separate cultural ways.

Poor Mr. Skolnik. It is a shock that he is so ardently supporting the ethnic cleansing of his own cousins.

2. Skolnik: “Most of the Arabs with ‘roots’ in the Land of Israel migrated there from other parts of the Arab world in the 19th and early 20th centuries while the Jews have been continuously present in the Land of Israel for well over 3000 years.”

This is another myth that was most prominently put forth in a book by Joan Peters, published in 1984, and entitled From Time Immemorial. Her argument and evidence were meticulously taken apart and shown to be false by Norman Finkelstein in his Image and Reality of the Israel-Palestine Conflict (1995).

3. Skolnik: “The displacement of the Arabs in the Land of Israel during Israel’s war of Independence … was paralleled by the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Jews living in Arab lands at the time whose lives were made unbearable under vindictive Arab rule.” Subsequently, the Israelis “received their Jewish brethren with open arms” while the Arab countries that received Arab refugees “herded them into camps and treated them like animals.”

For an editor of a 22-volume encyclopedia Skolnik shows a deplorable tendency to slip into generalizing, stereotyping and lumping together multiple events with multiple outcomes. Here are some counterpoints:

–Actually, the exodus of Arab Jews from their countries of residence went on over an extended period of time and in some cases, such as Algeria, had nothing to do with the events in Palestine. In other cases where the Arab country found itself at war with Israel, as with Egypt, Jewish immigration was a direct result of the Zionist expulsion of Arabs. And in the case of Morocco, the government tried hard to assure the Jews safety and prosperity to counter Zionist propaganda urging them to leave.

–Sometimes the “displacement” was hastened, as in Iraq, by Zionist agents committing violent acts of sabotage against local Jewish communities.

–The reception the Arab Jews got in Israel wasn’t quite the “open arms” picture Skolnik paints. They were received by their European Jewish “brethren” with racial prejudice. Even today, Ashkenazi and Sephardic/Mizrachi relations in Israel are strained.

–As for the Arab refugees who were allegedly “treated like animals” by their fellow Arabs, this is an exaggeration. The situation differed country to country. For instance, treatment in Lebanon was bad; in Jordan it was good. In none of the refugee camps in Arab countries were conditions worse than those in the tent cities and “development towns” in the Negev Desert into which the Israelis herded 80 percent of the Arab Jewish refugees.

4. Mr. Skolnik has other points which time and space do not allow me to address. The interested reader can find them in his response to my essay on Dr. Falk. If you read and consider them please take the time to follow up with other sources of information, such as the works of the Israeli historians Ilan Pappe and Benny Morris as well as the journalistic pieces of Amira Hass and Gideon Levy (both of whom work for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz), and the reports of Israel’s human rights group B’Tselem. These are all Israeli sources, but they tell a very different story than does Skolnik.

From Skolnik to Gaza

As Mr. Skolnik so aptly demonstrates, we all live within our own world. These are usually constructed for us by our upbringing: our families, our peers, our schools, our friends and the level of attachment we develop to the community. This attachment is usually sustained and deepened by the reinforcing information environment that the community provides for us.

These environments at once transform us into “good” citizens and simultaneously narrow our views of the world so they conform to acceptable political and cultural paradigms. The process usually works quite well. Nevertheless, it is still true that in any community you get a continuum of acceptance and devotion ranging from the skeptic to the true believer. For the latter, the community can do no wrong and its behavior can always be rationalized. When it comes to Israel, Skolnik is a true believer.

In a country like Israel, one that has armed itself to the teeth yet feels perennially insecure, and where the true believers are in charge, the situation is made dangerous in the extreme. Over the years Israeli leaders, generally believing the same things that Fred Skolnik believes, have dispossessed and ethnically cleansed the Palestinians, pushing them into ever smaller areas of concentration.

Gaza is the worst example of these cases. It is a virtual “open air prison” of a million and half people squeezed into 139 square miles, the most densely populated place on earth. There, with the compliance of the United States and the European Union, the Israelis have proceeded to reduce most of the Gazans to abject poverty.

When, periodically, these people strike out at their tormenters, usually in ineffective ways, they are labeled terrorists and, again with Western blessing, attacked furiously and disproportionately by the Israelis. You can now witness the latest onslaught live on the web.

Under these circumstances Skolnik’s assertions that the Jews were in Palestine first and the Arabs only came later as interlopers is really besides the point. Let us say, just for the sake of argument, that he is correct, that the Jews, even in their European guise, are the real indigenous Palestinians, having come back to the homeland after an extended absence of a couple of thousand years.

Even granted this fiction, does any of that give today’s Israeli Jews the right to treat the Palestinians as they do? Does it justify the creation of an apartheid environment in the occupied West Bank? Does it give them the right to reduce a million and half Gazans to a calculated impoverishment and then provoke them until they respond, whereupon Israelis indulge themselves in self-righteous mass murder?

I don’t believe any of Skolnik’s pseudo-history. I also don’t give a damn who lived in or controlled Palestine 3,000 years ago. The ones who control it now are, by their actions, no better than barbarians. And the leaders in the West who back them have Palestinian blood on their hands.

When it comes to behaviors like ethnic cleansing and cultural genocide, the claim of self-defense is ludicrous. Nor can the fantasies of Fred Skolnik justify such on-going crimes.

Pro-Israel historians such as Fred Skolnik have failed to keep up with recent archeological evidence in addition to their other short-comings. About a year or so ago new archeological evidence came to light where it is now believed that the original peoples of the Southern Levant were the Phoenicians.

In Israel, “minimalist archeologists”, those who only use actual facts to guide their investigations, as compared to “biblical archeologists” (those who begin their research with biblical premises), have consistently found evidence that continuously disproves current claims of Jewish ancestory in Palestine.

Though I agree with everything Professor Davidson has written, his points on the following should have been better sourced.

As Wikipedia may be completely correct regarding the history of the Palestinian People, it has little credibility among serious researchers of history whether they be professionals, students, or avocational historians. Wikipedia is know to have many inaccuracies.

Second, the impetus for Iraqi Jews emigrating from Iraq in the 1950s has still not been substantiated to my knowledge as it regards Zionist “scare tactics” to encourage such movement. The promotion of such Zionist intrigue has been made on many occasions. However, the serious research on the subject has still not been able conclude with any certainty that it occurred. I believe the two leading sources on the subject are a former Hagannah agent and a British military investigator.

Steve Naidamast

November 19, 2012 at 11:47 am

In addition to my previous comments I also have to take issue with the poster, Borat, who I have begun to see around the Internet discussions on this subject, as it regards the Joan Peter’s book, “From Time Immemorial”, and Alan Dershowitz.

Before Dr. Finkelstein reviewed this book in and around 1995, UK researchers on the subject, soon after the book was published, demolished the author’s credibility and substantially so.

As it regards Dr. Dershowitz, anyone who uses him in any way to substantiate anything historical has no credibility whatsoever. Dr. Dershowitz has been also demolished by not only Dr. Finkelstein but by many others as well in terms of his historical accuracy. In addition, he is the leading “Zionist Windbag” in the United States, which should be more than enough to disqualify him as a credible source…

Allan Yorkowitz

November 19, 2012 at 7:05 pm

For an article written by an educated man, who quotes another educated man, the old adage holds true – a little education can be a dangerous thing. To even write that Israel wants an ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, is a morally wrong,yes, ignorant statement. How many Palestinians live in Israel- over 10,000? Is Israel throwing them out? Or have they been given citizenship, and equal rights under Israeli law? The radical Palestinians in the Gaza are another issue. These are Israeli haters who care nothing for their own people in the Gaza. I had to smile when I read this “intellectual” article quoted from Wickipedia about the Palestinian people. You intellectuals I guess need an education to what this site is…it’s people posting their OPINIONS on issues that change constantly. In my school district, we will not accept this site as a credible source. I guess academia feels differently – or simply does not know better.

incontinent reader

November 20, 2012 at 9:35 am

Mr. Yorkowitz, I suggest you read “The General’s Son” by Miko Peled, visit his website at http://www.mikopeled.com and listen to the following book reading lecture, if you really want to understand how Palestinians who are Israeli citizens are treated. Unfortunately, there is discrimination built into the law, and into the educational system (including its textbooks) and the political reality is that the Likud has made Israel less of a democratic society. If you have an open mid about it, commit an hour to listening to: Miko Peled at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOaxAckFCuQ This is an Israeli who knows what is happening, has impeccable credentials and is not afraid of speaking blunt truths. If we want to see peace in the region we must address the reality of the situation and go from there.

John

November 20, 2012 at 7:45 pm

Mr. Yorkowitz, and anyone else should read the works of Jonathan Cook especially “Welcome to Nazareth” which touches the very subject of democracy in Israel. He was born in Britain and lives in Nazareth with his Palestinian Christian wife. As for Borat on an earlier subject on food in Gaza, they may have food but as the Red Cross, BMJ and others report, the food is high carbohydrate and lacking in essential nutrients and this is hurting all Gazans particularly children. He constantly comes up with foolish answers to dismiss wickedness. I don’t condone rocket attacks but when you treat a lot of people badly some are going to react violently. Most Palestinians want peace with equity and that is the only route for Israel’s salvation in the future. Too bad some don’t see that, many do. Borat doesn’t talk about the likes of Shimon Gapso who bans Christmas trees in public places in Nazareth, and avowing the city was for Jews only amongst other things. And it wasn’t long ago that Avigdor Lieberman was sounding off for the transporting out of Arabs from Israel.

paschn

November 24, 2012 at 12:32 pm

Another alarming act occurring in AmeriKa is the constant war on Christian/ Christmas icons displayed on public owned “Christian” property waged by Jewish organizations while gigantic menorahs grace lawns yards from the White house. A gaudy badge of ownership perhaps? Separation of Church and state simply means the governing body will NOT pass legislation giving favorable status, one religeon over another…. Using that as a guidline, it would appear that D.C. has already done that….just not showing the favoritism one would expect in a “Christian” nation, eh?

The one state solution with one man, one vote is the only moral/ethical positon.

borat

November 20, 2012 at 9:55 am

antisemitic myths by the usual antisemites and their sick minions

paschn

November 26, 2012 at 10:05 am

Evil little “shill”… watch this short but succinct clip from a fellow israle, (your real home’s calling Bore), whom is obviously speaking from first hand experience…. One can say this is “from the horses mouth”;

Central Banks not only victimize the Goyim, they use and abuse secular Jews as well. If you are a god-fearing Christian/Muslim/Jewish nation how can you justify a usurous monetary system enslaving all those it touches?

John

November 20, 2012 at 7:47 pm

anti-Palestinian myths by the usual semites and their sick minions Borat

borat

November 23, 2012 at 2:03 pm

john is a typical pie in the sky eyed apologist for the medieval homicide bombers, abusers of women and children, and the so called palestinian “government” hamas which is sworn to Israel’s destruction. Like most antisemites, heaven forbid Jews should defend themselves, or fight to survive amongst the hordes of the medieval paradises in the sand.

paschn

November 24, 2012 at 12:17 pm

Interesting article on a bit of Israeli “tech”. Interesting I’m sure, to Iran’s plans of defense against the joined-at-the-hip dual world terrorist organizations referred to as Ameria and Israel. Now that Iran has duplicated U.S. drones and sent them on 30 minute “tourist trips” over Israel the pathetic performance of Iron dome will play well into plans to minimize Palestinian collateral damage when AIPAC gives the order in D.C. to send in the fools yet again.

The Palestine Myth An Arab Islamic Palestine or Palestinian people is a myth. Historically, Palestine meant the Jewish ‘Holy Land’ and Palestinian stood for ‘Jews of the Holy Land’… So the current understanding of Palestine and Palestinians is a myth at best and hijacking of what belonged to others at worst.

The term “Palestine” has conjured up many images and meanings throughout the centuries. In the Christian West, the term was synonymous for the “Promised Land” or the “Holy Land”, that is, the Land of the Jews. Throughout the centuries, the terms “Palestine” and “Palestinian” were analogous to the terms “Israel” and “Jew”. This is quite evident from reading books, articles, newspapers, and encyclopedias. “Palestinian” was used to identify Jews living in the Holy Land as opposed to Jews living elsewhere, such as in Babylonia, Persia, Greece, Rome, or elsewhere. In fact, within Judaism there is even a Talmud (ancient composition of commentary on the Bible) that is called by historians the “Palestinian Talmud,” as opposed to the “Babylonian Talmud.”

Nevertheless, within the last forty to fifty years, a perverse and vicious transmogrification of the term “Palestine” has taken root among anti-Jews and Israel haters around the globe, most notably in the Arab/Muslim world, and in the increasingly “dhimmified” European world. A name in Arabic – “Filastin” – that has no historical connotations or etymological meaning for Arabs and other Muslims – has now taken on the properties of a wholesale myth that could fill volumes of vitriolic and venomous propaganda. Indeed, the whole distortion and myth of an Arab “Palestine” has become a virtual religion unto itself.

How did this myth of a non-existent people and non-existent land of “Filastin” ever come to be? The answer lies in the tragic history of the Roman-Jewish “encounter” during the 1st and 2nd centuries, when Israel (then called Judea) was occupied by the Roman Empire

Roman rule The Jews bitterly resented being ruled by the pagan Romans, and for over a century fought to regain their independence. Twice during Roman rule, an independent Kingdom of Judea existed. First, under Herod the Great (while Augustus was emperor), and then under Herod’s grandson, Herod Agrippa, (while Claudius was emperor). Regardless, all ended in disaster when the Jews rose in revolt in 66 A.D., and fought a four year war with Rome that resulted – according to the eyewitness historian Josephus – with close to a million Jewish deaths, and the destruction of Jerusalem and the Holy Temple.

Yet Judea, while conquered, remained a restive province in the Roman Empire. This changed dramatically and drastically in 132 A.D. when a Jewish warrior by the name of Simeon bar Kokhba raised another revolt against Rome. The war lasted for three years and was so intense, that the Emperor Hadrian had to recall his greatest general, Julius Severus from Britain. It took close to a dozen Roman legions to put down the revolt, but when it was finished, so was Judea. Hadrian had had enough of the Jews and their revolts and decided to rename Judea “Syria Palestina.” The name “Palestina” was chosen after the Philistines – ancient enemies of the Israelites. It was nothing more than pouring salt into the wounds of the already defeated Jews. Jerusalem’s name was not spared either and was renamed “Aelia Capitolina.” And so it appeared that the “Jewish Question” of the 1st and 2nd centuries had been “solved.” However, Jews continued to remain as a majority in their conquered land.

The situation remained static until the Arabs marched out of the Arabian desert conquering every country in sight for Allah and Muhammad. In 635 A.D., the Arabs conquered the Holy Land from Byzantium. However, it appears that the Muslims had no real interest in the land. In fact, when they entered Jerusalem, they apparently did not realize where they were, as they first called the city “Iliyas,” nothing more than an Arabicized form of the Latin “Aelia” (which, as previously stated, was substituted for the name of Jerusalem). In an ironic twist of fate, it was a Jew who had converted to Islam that pointed out to the Caliph Omar where he and his occupation army were now standing; namely, Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. It was then that the Arabs decided to call the city “Al Quds” and “Beit al Muqdas.” Once again, these are nothing but Arabicized terms from the original Hebrew: “Ha-Qodesh” and “Beit ha-Miqdash” which respectively mean “the Holy (City)” and “the Holy House” (i.e., “Holy Temple”).

Ancient Jerusalem The Arab-Muslims now called the land “Jund Filastin” (Province of Palestine) – a direct borrowing from the Greco-Roman term. But because Arabic has no “p” sound in it language, “Palestina” became “Filastin.” Indeed, every name of every so-called “Arab village” in Israel is nothing more than an Arabic perversion of the original Hebrew, Greek or Latin names for a city. (To name just two: “Habrun” – from the Hebrew “Hevron”, and “Nablus” –Nea Polis, (“New City”) built on the ruins of biblical Shechem.) The Arab Muslim disinterest in the land was so great that with the exception of the city of Ramleh (perhaps built on the Jewish ruins of the city Ramathaim Zophim, according to some archaeologists) no other city was ever built by the Arabs or the other Muslim conquerors. Even more ironic, it was Ramleh that became the provincial capital of “Filastin.” Jerusalem played absolutely no significance with the major exception of the building of Masjid Al-Aqsa (the Mosque of Al Aqsa) and Qubbat as-Sahra (the Dome of the Rock) over the ruins of the Jewish Temple. And the reason for building these structures was to show the superiority of Islam over Judaism, and to be in “competition” with the Christian Holy Sepulchre which had been built nearby, centuries earlier.

Palestine Nothing changed over the centuries as the denuded land of “Palestine” went from one conqueror to another. Finally, in 1917, Britain wrested the land from the Ottomans and after promising the Jews a homeland in their ancestral country, the League of Nations awarded a Mandate to the British which extended over both the western and eastern banks of the Jordan River. It was at this point that the term “Palestine” was revived as a quasi-political entity ruled by a British governor.

While the Jews began to call their newspapers, charities, and organizations such names as the “Palestine Post” and the “United Palestine Appeal,” the Arabs eschewed the term as being “Jewish” and “Zionist.” For them, they were Muslims first, and “Southern Syrians” second. Indeed, many an Arab politician and historian denied that there was ever a country called “Palestine.” To name the amount of Arab political figures and historians who stated this would require an article all by itself. Suffice to say that Arabs such as the late Hashemite monarch Hussein “Chairman” Arafat, and noted Arab historian Philip K. Hitti, have all candidly admitted that no such country as “Palestine” ever existed. In fact, the latter, while appearing in front of a January 11, 1946 Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry in Washington, D.C. stated “[T]here is no such thing as Palestine in history, absolutely not.” The late King Hussein, who knew about artificial entities (i.e., Transjordan – now “Jordan”) said that “[T]he truth is that Jordan is Palestine, and Palestine is Jordan.” He said this on more than one occasion in the 19070s and as late as December 26, 1981 in an interview with the Paris based Arabic newspaper An-Nahar Al Arabi (“The Arabic Daily”). Many other Hashemites (past and present) have made similar statements. Indeed, without the help of Churchill and Britain, there would never have been a “Hashemite entity” on the East Bank of the Jordan created in 1922 and carved out of the original “Palestine Mandate” for the Jewish National Home. And in one of the most candid admissions ever made, Zuhair Muhsin, little known leader of the PLO splinter gang known as “Al Sa’iqa” (The Storm) and backed by Syria, said in a March 31, 1977 interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw:

Zuhair Muhsin Muhsin was assassinated in 1979 The Palestinian people does not exist.

The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese.

Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct Palestinian people to oppose Zionism.

For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan

Yasser Arafat

And of course, there was “Chairman” Arafat who in a 1974 interview with The New Republic stated: “What you call Jordan is actually Palestine.”

Regardless, until the founding of the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1964, “Palestine” and “Palestinian” had no meaning for the Arabs. As an aside, the fact that the PLO was created in 1964 by the League of Arab States and not after the June “Six Day War” of 1967, is telling enough that Ahmad Shuqayri (original founder of the PLO), and his successor Yasser Arafat, were looking for the total extermination of Israel, while Jordan already had the “occupied territories” of the “West Bank,” and Egypt had the “Gaza Strip.” For them and for the PLO (or PA of today), “Palestine” is just a part of the “Arab Muslim national homeland” that has to be liberated from the “infidel” Jews. As late as 1967, even the UN did not refer to the term “Palestinians” merely calling them “refugees.” (Resolution 242 of November 22, 1967.) However, as the late 1960s turned into the 1970s, the historical terminology of “Palestine” began to be turned upside down, and hijacked by the Arabs. It now became terms synonymous with Arabs, but in reality was only a weapon in the fight to extirpate Israel from the world.

The facts are undeniable. “Palestine” has no meaning in Greek, Latin, Arabic, or English. It is a general fact that a people give their name to a country, not vice-versa. Thus, the Arabs call their homeland, “Jazirat al-Arab” or “Island of the Arabians.” The Jews call their land Israel because they were called Israelites; Israel in Hebrew meaning “to strive with God.” Similarly, it was called Judah or Judea after the tribe of Judah (meaning “praise” in Hebrew). Ironically, it is only one language in which the term “Palestine” has a meaning, and that language is Hebrew. The name translated as “Philistia” in the Holy Bible comes from the Hebrew “Peleshet” which means nothing more than “land of the Philistines.” Contrary to Arab propaganda, the Philistines were a non-Semitic, Indo-European people who migrated to what is now Gaza. Historians believe that these “sea peoples” originated in the Aegean area of what is now Crete.

In conclusion, one can only imagine if Hadrian had never changed the name of Israel from Judea to Palestina. We might very well have seen a “Judea Liberation Organization” instead of a “Palestine Liberation Organization” and we might very well be hearing the mantra of the “inalienable rights of the Judean Arab people.” At the same time, if Hadrian had changed the name of Judea to Mars, we would be hearing of the “Martian Arab people.” Of course, this sounds absurd, but not any more absurd than the fictitious mythical land and people of “Palestine.”

Israel would be well advised to learn from the cruel fates of history which has a way of repeating itself. Judea did not exist alongside “Palestina” after Hadrian’s destruction in the 2nd century. Similarly today, in the 21st century, it is impossible for Israel to exist “side by side in peace” with a “Palestine” that seeks to replicate and complete Hadrian’s war against the Jews. One state or the other can exist, but never both. Israel is a historical reality. Arab “Palestine” is an artificial invention. Inevitably, a “two state solution” will lead to nothing less than a final solution for the state of Israel, and perhaps for the Jews of the world. It is time for Israel to take a courageous stand and face the painful facts of reality – and history.

paschn

November 26, 2012 at 10:30 am

ROFL. Ever hear of the very powerful Shamanistic nation of Khazaria? Located in the Caspian basin? they were of Turkic/Mongol heritage. before they met the same fate as that coming to AmeriKa, they decided to become Talmudic Jews…Around 740 A.D. So,…this “biblical chosen” w/o one iota of Semetic DNA had a leader who decided for political expediency, (Caspian basin lay right smack in between the Christian West and Muslim East), to have a mass “turtle-necking” of their sexual organs and become…TA DA!! Jews! Now, grasp this Bore….The descendants of this neo-judaic Shamanistic “tribe” are the modern day Ashkenazis…the “money Lenders”….fathers of the Central Banking international slave-trading cabal. Over 90% of the terrorists in occupied Palestine are Ashkenazi with +/- 5% Sephardic. Oops! so much for the land given to the seed of Abraham…

“Israel”, (occupied/stolen Palestine), Is a gift from the thieving swine in Colonial “Great” Britain, (Balfour Agreement), to the Ashkenazi, (non Semite), Money masters/creators of the money from debt Rothschild gang, for suckering AmeriKa into entering the War to pull Britain’s LOSING ASS out of the fire THEY caused in Europe along with France to please their owners in The City of London.

Ironic, don’t you think, Bore, that so much evidence of your rabid hatred and immoral/illegal existance of the nasty little nation of israel is being revealed by ex-members of “the tribe’ that realized the evil of their ways and joined main stream humanity, eh?

borat

November 27, 2012 at 9:48 am

A Fateful Week for the Middle East

This week ushers in two significant events.

The first is a milestone anniversary. On November 29, 1947, the UN General Assembly, by a vote of 33 in favor, 13 opposed, and ten abstentions, endorsed Resolution 181, otherwise known as the Palestine Partition Plan.

That plan recommended the division of the land, then under British mandatory rule, into two states — one Jewish, the other Arab.

While the Jewish side was unhappy that the proposed boundaries of the Jewish state reduced the land envisioned in the 1917 Balfour Declaration to one-eighth its original size, it nevertheless accepted the plan.

However, the Arab world rejected the very notion of partition, since it would not accept the legitimacy of any sovereign Jewish entity in the region.

The Iraqi delegate to the UN stated, “I wish to put on record that Iraq does not recognize the validity of this decision.”

His view was echoed by his Syrian counterpart, who declared: “Gentlemen, the [UN] Charter is dead. But it did not die a natural death; it was murdered, and you all know who is guilty. My country will never recognize such a decision.”

Their defiant views were rejected by a decisive majority of UN member states at the time. Nor did they find sympathy with UN Secretary General Trygve Lie.

In his memoirs, In the Cause of Peace: Seven Years with the United Nations, he wrote: “The partition of Palestine and the consequent creation of the State of Israel became one of the most dramatic chapters of early United Nations history. As Secretary-General, I put the full weight of my office consistently behind the Organization’s decision from the time it was first taken.”

Later, in describing the actual events of May 1948, the Secretary-General stated: “The Arab states launched their invasion of Palestine with the end of the [British] Mandate. This was armed defiance of the United Nations [emphasis added], and they openly proclaimed their aggression by telegraphing news of it to United Nations headquarters.”

Why is it so important, 65 years later, to recall these events?

First, to underscore the UN’s deliberative process. In 1947, the UN acted only after intensive investigation into the best outcome for two competing nationalisms — Jewish and Arab.

Second, to bear in mind that a two-state solution was the recommendation of the UN itself, and that the Jewish side accepted it both in principle and in practice.

And third, to remember that it was the UN Secretary-General who labeled the Arab military response, seeking the annihilation of the fledgling Jewish state, “armed defiance of the United Nations.”

Now fast forward to this week.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has demanded recognition of “Palestine” as a non-member observer state of the UN, a status currently held by the Holy See and previously by Switzerland, until it became a full member in 2002.

The issue is expected to come before the UN General Assembly on November 29, the same day, 65 years ago, that the world body endorsed the Partition Plan.

But unlike that plan, this Palestinian gambit was not the result of UN study missions and months-long discussions involving a range of countries. On the contrary, it is a Palestinian idea, endorsed, predictably, by the Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Conference, which will have no beneficial impact on the ground.

If the Palestinian Authority today is serious about overcoming its many past rejections of a two-state deal, then progress can only be achieved at the negotiating table with Israel, the other party to the conflict.

Turning instead to the UN is actually avoidance diplomacy, bypassing the one party that really counts.

Since 1947, history has moved on. Unlike the situation then, today a Palestinian state can only emerge as a result of direct talks between the parties themselves.

Those nations truly committed to advancing the peace process should therefore think twice about what the Palestinians are asking them to endorse.

Support for this Palestinian move will only give license to the internationalization of the conflict, open the doors for an upgraded “Palestine” to wage war against Israel in the International Criminal Court and other UN agencies, and thereby widen, not narrow, the gulf between the parties.

And finally, what exactly constitutes the borders of Mr. Abbas’ “Palestine”?

For example, do they include Hamas-ruled Gaza, which he purports to represent but has been unable to enter for over five years, and over which he has no governing authority?

Yet even assuming he did represent it, how could he explain to UN member states the recent deadly violence that emanated from Gaza? This was a brazen act of aggression against Israel, a UN member state — an act which Mr. Abbas has refused to condemn.

Having made one tragic mistake in 1947 by spurning a proposed two-state deal, will the supporters of the Palestinian cause now make another in 2012 by rebuffing Israel’s latest offer to negotiate a two-state deal, and instead seek a UN end-run that will lead nowhere?

Given the record, I wouldn’t bet against it.

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